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Built into the cliffs overlooking the Suvan Sea, Riverfall resides on the edge of grasslands of Cyphrus where the Bluevein River plunges off the plain and cascades down to the inland sea below. Home of the Akalak, Riverfall is a self-supporting city populated by devoted warriors. [Riverfall Codex]

The loud hiss of Kamilla's shushing could be heard not even a tick after the impatient violet flower's question, though in her attempt to avoid drawing unwanted attention to the magically annoyingly and talkative plant, she'd named Roo, she'd instead drawn the attention to herself as the woman walking around with a pot plant in her left hand and the head of a gray yowlwing peeking out of the bag hanging from her right shoulder, whilst shushing them from time to time. A few suspicious gazes from people passing by caused the sorceress to roll her brown eyes in reaction as she continued on through the streets of Riverfall and towards the beach. "We're nearly there, just stay quiet."

When she'd awoken in her room at the Kulkukan Inn that morning Kamilla had barely had time to stretch when her,rarely silent, pot plant had insisted that it not be left to spend yet another day in the room with only Yen, her excessively lazy yowlwing for company. Kamilla may have been new to pet owning and plant owning but even she felt bad that she hadn't given the former enough space to spread its literal wings, as for the plant's desire for an excursion, she was certain that was unique to just her and the few other Rivarian's who'd been foolish enough to purchase one of the specimens of talking flora from the mysterious mage during the previous season. However, the weather had seemed pleasant enough and she'd been meaning to take Yen for a walk anyways so bringing Roo along was the equivalent of killing two birds with one stone, even if one of the birds had no place being in need of killing.

Judging by the position of Syna above them, it was probably nearing midday as the sorceress took her first sinking step onto the sand, not bothering to remove her thigh high boots. The soothing sounds and smell of the ocean greeted her as she moved further up the beach and past several groups of people who'd had a similar idea to her own on where to spend the day. Her long brown waves of hair fell loosely down her back and around her face today, her short purple dress with lace tail and boots being the only things worn by her, having chosen to forego jewelry and makeup.

Although she'd long since reached the beach Kamilla continued to walk further along the shoreline for several chimes, trudging through the soft sand determined to find a spot where they'd be unseen and unbothered. In actual fact, taking both Yen and Roo for a walk was only two thirds of the sorceress' goal for the day, the third bird to be killed, with the singular ocean-side stone, being some reimancy practice. Since arriving in Riverfall and even during the season before, which she'd spent on the road, Kamilla had not had much chance to improve her uses of the elemental magic and during the few brief moments when she had used it, she'd noticed that her djed had become slightly stiff and unresponsive, like a limb that hadn't been exercised in a long while.

"Are we there now?"

Kamilla didn't bother shushing the violet flower this time, despite the nagging tone in its androgynous voice, to be honest, she was impressed by the amount of time it had managed to stay silent since it's previous questioning. "Yes Roo, we're here." she said in the direction of the flower, as if it was the most normal thing to do in the world, her right arm reaching down towards her bag so her fingers could scratch the soft gray fur behind Yen's ears, earning her a soft but notable purr from the lazy yowlwing, the winged feline seeming just as comfortable atop her books and writing supplies as she was anywhere else.

After a chime more of sandy steps Kamilla finally came to a halt, turning on her heel to check if there was anyone else in sight and was relieved to see there wasn't, she'd walked so far along the shore that it had begun to curve away from the view of the city. Finally satisfied with their location, Kamilla knelt down to take a seat on the dry sand beneath her, digging the base of the small stone pot she'd created for Roo, using geomancy, firmly into the sand so it wouldn't topple over.

The flower's stem was almost twice the length of the tiny pot it emerged from, despite having been about half of its current length only a few days ago when Kamilla had accidentally picked the beautiful magical plant and been forced to buy it. "You're gonna need a new pot soon." she said as she crossed her legs and got comfortable, pulling Yen from her bag and placing the gray yowlwing on her lap so she could casually stroke her fur and be rewarded with more soft purrs. The feline gave no resistance to being relocated, her large bright green eyes opening to investigate her new surroundings before shutting once again the moment Kamilla's hands ran across her fur.

"Please, its been getting cramped in here for days now."

Kamilla could only crack a small smile in response to the plant's complaint, despite often wishing Roo would just remain silent she had quickly grown fond of its company. To think, a season ago she'd never had the responsibility of having to look after anything but herself and now, although she was still very much learning and adjusting, she was glad to have them as they made her impersonal room at the inn feel far less empty. "I'll attempt to make it smoother, more even and out of a different, less brittle, stone this time." Even as she spoke, her brown eyes were looking into the distance, enjoying the wonderful combination of sunlight, sight of the ocean and sound of waves crashing, along with the soft fur and purring of the animal in her lap.

Several chimes passed by with the unusual trio remaining as is, Kamilla enjoying the peaceful atmosphere, Yen enjoying the soft strokes along her back and Roo planted before them, making short comments on their surroundings that required no reply, every now and then. Gentle breezes brushed across the exposed skin of her arms and shoulders, the long wavy strands of brown hair swaying slightly each time one passed by and for those few moments she was content. She'd always enjoyed her alone time, though now that she had pets to spend those times with the moments felt less empty, perhaps it was because there was none of the implied expectation that came with being in the presence of other people but at the same time she wasn't alone.

The silence continued for another chime, uninterrupted by Roo, at which point Kamilla was the one to break it with a passing statement based on an observation of her winged pet cat. "You know, I'm surprised Yen didn't take off the moment I pulled her from the bag." The yowlwing was, after all, capable of flight and spent most of her days cooped up in a room at the inn which was barely big enough for the feline to move around in. One of Yen's ears perked up at the mention of her name but other than that she made no attempt at doing anything.

"Well, I'm not. That feline moves around less than I do... and, as you know, I'm Rooted in place."

Kamilla did not know where the plant had picked up its peculiar sense of humor but she could do nothing other than froen slightly at its silly attempt, though Roo had certainly gotten its point across, Yen was astonishingly lazy as well as antisocial. It seemed that unless scratches or food were involved, the green eyed, gray yowlwing was completely happy to simply lounge around all day, except on the rare occasions when someone visited her room at the inn, which Yen always responded too by immediately moving to hide either behind the desk or under the bed, she didn't seem scared though, simply uninterested in anyone who wasn't Kamilla. She was surprised by how good she was at understanding Yen's body language and needs, considering she'd never owned a pet before, though Kamilla was sure that most of what felt like 'instinct' was simply the remnant knowledge and memories of the deceased mage Felius, the same things that made the very sight of the gray feline, or any feline, fill her with inexplicable excitement.

Upwards of half a bell had passed since Kamilla and her companions had arrived in 'their' secluded beach spot when the sorceress had finally grown bored of simple relaxation, she was, after all, itching to dive back into her reimancy practice. Gently, she lifted the gray feline from her lap and placed her on the sand beside her, suddenly regretting not bringing something for Yen to lay on to avoid getting her fur covered in sand, though that thought quickly went out of the window as the yowlwing sprung up from its position on the sand and darted off, spreading her gray wings and taking off into the sky.

"Its like scratches and strokes keep her paralyzed with comfort."

Kamilla couldn't disagree with the flower's words, since Yen did indeed seem content to simply enjoy the attention for as long as possible. The sight of her yowlwing soaring upwards and into the sky always gave the sorceress a feeling of dread and regret, what if she never returned? What if something happened to her while she was soaring with the birds? These and many more fears had crossed Kamilla's mind but she'd learnt over time that there was no point in worrying, Yen always seemed to return to wherever she'd been released by Kamilla, often with some poor insect in her mouth.

After allowing herself to enjoy the sight of her yowlwing swooping happily through the air for several moments longer, Kamilla reached into her bag and pulled out her inscribing paint, carefully dipping the tip of her left index finger into it which she then used to draw her focus glyph on the palm of her hand. Her personalized focus glyph was made up of a series of swooping curved lines that had a slightly floral appearance once complete. Once she'd completed the focus on her right palm she dipped her other index finger in the paint and began to draw the same focus glyph on her left palm, though it took a bit longer than the first since she was not right handed.

Satisfied with both glyphs, Kamilla got to her feet, using the back of her hands to push herself up so as not to ruin the freshly drawn runes on her palms. Once standing, her arms rose above her head as she stretched herself out, not unlike a cat, the arch of her back deepening for a few ticks before returning to normal along with the dropping of her arms to her sides. Since it had been a while since her last real attempt at reimancy, Kamilla thought it best to make herself comfortable and relaxed in order to improve the fluidity of her djed along with the focus glyphs to improve her res production.

The sorceress had had plenty of time to think about what she needed to do during her practice, she still only had control of the elements of earth and air but gaining control of another element came second on her list of priorities as she'd decided that improving her casting would benefit her much more in the long run, regardless of which elements she had. As for her casting methods, she'd already broken it down into what she thought to be the three key parts that made up any spell, there was the element itself, the amount and state of res, the state being gaseous, liquid or gel-like and finally the shape and control over it, which went together because depending on how complicated the shape of the spell was the degree of control over it changed as well.

Element and state of res were the two straight forward ones, once she'd attained an element it was easy enough to transmute res into it, the state of her res was simple enough to change and choose as well with little effort on Kamilla's behalf, but shape and control, that was where the biggest potential for improvement rested. Kamilla had long since noticed that while creating a shape to use during a spell, for example, the thin flattened ring of her earth chakram spell, the amount of concentration required to continually maintain the res shape while also trying to maneuver it was far larger than the concentration needed to control something simpler, like a ball of res.

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, Kamilla held one of her hands palm upwards and began tugging at her inner well of energy and coaxing it towards the focus glyph. At first her djed simply shuddered at the attention, then slowly it began to ripple outwards like the surface of a still lake that someone had just tossed a pebble into and then finally it began to flow slowly towards the intended area, the djed crossing over into res, helped along by the focus glyph. She watched as drops of glistening lavender res floated upwards from the mark on her palm, slowly gathering above it until a ball the size of a small rock hovered before her.

During her years in training as a reimancer, Kamilla had cemented several spells into her memory, the benefit being that through many sessions of practice she could now cast them without requiring her concentration in full. Among these memorized spells there was the gaseous vortex, which she often used to pick up very light things like dust and loose pages in order to gather them into a singular spot, the most obvious use being for cleaning, then there was the whip like string of res which had multiple uses and then her personal favorite, the chakram, a spinning ring which could be used as a projectile when transmuted to earth, or a grinder when maintained and used with air. All of her memorized castings had their uses but the true power of reimancy was in its ability to adapt to any situation and unfortunately she knew that sometimes there would be circumstances where she'd need to adapt and create new spells under pressure, like the time she'd been attacked by a glassbeak in the Testing Grounds of Sahova.

The sorceress was well aware that she wouldn't always have the luxury of time and a controlled environment and with these unpredictable situations in mind, she needed to find a more generic and adaptable method that was easier to control. Plenty of thought had gone into her dilemma over the past few seasons and she'd come to the conclusion that the key to improving overall control lied in one specific aspect of casting. Visualization.

Using the memorized shape of the chakram, Kamilla willed her res to take it's practiced form, the glistening ball of res flattening into the shape and size of a disc like bracelet. As usual, there were two layers to the spell, the outer layer, which she then transmuted to hard stone and the inner that remained res in order to control the chakram. Even with this practiced spell, Kamilla had noticed the problem, visualizing and willing her res into the form of the chakram was simple enough and moving and manipulating it was as well, but doing both simultaneously was far more taxing on her focus.

Holding her open palm out in front of her, Kamilla willed the floating disc of stone to shoot forward, following the projectile with her gaze as she moved her hand to the left focusing on making the spell follow her indicated path, which it did, soaring in a half circle before she changed its path once more by firing it out into the ocean, transmuting its inner layer to earth as well before it exited her radius of influence. She watched as the stone struck a small wave, cutting through it and emerging on the other side only to fall and disappear into the sea with a small splash.

There it was again, the dividing of her focus between visualizing the chakram's shape and maintaining that image of its shape while also imagining it moving. It seemed that the mental image of a simple ring maneuvering itself in ways that were impossible for a real chakram required two simultaneous visualizations, one for shape and one for movement, but what if she visualized something that could move on its own, wouldn't that be simpler? The concept was simple enough, but she could not think of any inanimate objects that could move in complicated patterns.

"What was the purpose of that exactly?"

A roll of the eyes was the only answer Kamilla offered the talking purple plant, choosing not to verbalize her thoughts on its question. A short groan of frustration escaped the sorceresses lips as she lowered herself to take a seat on the sand once more. Perhaps she was needlessly complicating things? Something that was not unusual for her. "You know..." Kamilla turned her gaze toward where Roo's voice was coming from, "What, Roo?" The flower seemed unfazed by the hint of annoyance in her voice, "That feline of yours is probably going to bring back another dead bird."

Curious as to why the purple flower thought she needed to hear that and what made it think of it in the first place, Kamilla's gaze went to the sky in search of her pet yowlwing. It took only a moment to spot the flying feline, a task made easy by the flock of fleeing birds, closely pursued by Yen. "You're probably right." It would be the third time the winged cat decided a dead creature would be an appropriate gift for its owner, one she neither needed nor wanted but a gift none the less.

Although she dreaded the possibility of a bird corpse being delivered to her by Yen, Kamilla continued to watch the feline's aerial pursuit, though after a while it became clear that despite having wings, the yowlwing just wasn't as gifted at flight as the seagulls it hunted. It was at that point that an idea began to form in the depths of her mind. "Of course!" Excitement filled her body as she came to the realization that she had been complicating her problem unnecessarily.

Getting to her feet once again, with more determination than the first time, Kamilla checked and was glad to see that the focus glyphs on her palms hadn't disappeared yet. Wasting no time she took a deep breath and began producing res, once again gathering the glistening lavender substance above her palm in the form of a small rock. This entire time she'd been so focused on the shape of the spell that she completely overlooked the fact that her res didn't have to take a geometric shape, the shape of an animal was just as feasible.

Now filled with purpose, Kamilla shut her eyes and began to visualize a very rough example of a bird's form in her mind and once she felt she could see it clearly enough she opened her eyes and willed her res to take on the form. Her own hands clasped together hooking at the thumbs to make a childish hand representation of a bird, but regardless of how silly it looked, when it came to reimancy, physical gestures always helped.

Once complete, the 'bird' shape Kamilla had been trying to recreate ended up looking more like a sharply pointed boomerang with a pointed spike through its center than an actual flying animal, though she supposed it somewhat resembled a sparrow flying overhead. Sighing in defeat, or lack of determination to improve the res sculpture, Kamilla decided that the current shape would have to do and began to will her res into an outer and inner layer so that she'd be able to transmute the shell of the spell and still manipulate its movements.

Satisfied, or rather content, with the spells shape and structure, Kamilla examined the palm sized floating 'bird' spell for a few moments, trying to memorize both the appearance and how it felt on a more intimate level, after all it was made up of her own spirit and just like her physical body, her djed also had its own equivalent to muscle memory which made recreating rehearsed spells much easier. Feeling fairly confident in having memorized the spell well enough, Kamilla willed her res out of the bird shape and into a ball before using her memory to recreate it once more, this time taking only a few ticks and therefore eliciting a small smile from the sorceress.

Noting that a significant amount of the res had already decayed due to being outside of her body, the bird shape now at least three quarters of its initial size, Kamilla transmuted the outer shell into solid stone before willing the spell to adjust itself to be parallel with her horizontal palm before firing it off towards the ocean and directing it using the untransmuted res within. This time the spell cut through the air not differing massively though there was definitely a noticeable improvement in both speed and ease of movement before she aimed it back in her direction and fired it once more, aiming slightly to the side of herself and transmuting the remaining res.

"Petch! What was that for?"

Kamilla tried her best to stifle a laugh managing to shrink it into a simple snort of amusement at the shock evident in her talking plant's voice. In her attempt to get the bird shaped stone spell to land somewhere near to her, she'd almost decapitated the purple flower, only able to watch, eyes widening in realization, as her fully transmuted(and thus uncontrollable) spell dove towards Roo, narrowly missing the mass of petals she thought of as its 'head' and landing only a foot behind it with a loud thud and plume of sand. However, the moment she knew he was fine, the humor became apparent.

"Almost soiled myself."

Barely succeeding in stopping the next laugh that threatened to escape her lips, Kamilla resorted to a simple smug smirk as she made her way over to the purple flower and began digging through the sand in search of the remnants of her spell. "It was an accident, Roo... I wasn't aiming at you." Her voice was completely lacking any hint of remorse but still filled with amusement, though on second thought she had been a little reckless, after all, once transmuted she had no control of her res. She made a mental note to pay extra attention to her aim when it was pointed in the direction of her or anyone else that she didn't want to hit.

After digging at least a foot into the sand, Kamilla's fingers finally made contact with the stone of the 'bird' shaped projectile, surprised to see how deeply it had embedded itself in the ground. Lifting the object to eye height she turned it over in her fingers a few times, inspecting its shape curiously before finally deciding she liked the shape and placing it into her bag along with any other belongings as she prepared to leave, having felt she'd spent enough time 'watching the waves', though it was more that she'd done what she'd come to do for the day and saw no reason to remain.

Brown eyes searched the sky for her pet yowlwing, but to no avail, where had the gray feline disappeared to? A loud sigh escaped the sorceress' lips, there was no sign of Yen or the previous flock of seagulls she'd been pursuing. "We're leaving as soon as Yen comes back." she said while not bothering to look at the talking plant as she spoke, eyes still scanning the sky, "Yen!" the sound of her shout contrasted the calm sound of the ocean far more than she'd have liked to admit, forcing Kamilla to wince slightly at the thought of anyone hearing her.

"I'm thiiiiirsty!"

Frowning at the exaggerated tone Roo had put on, genuinely sounding like it hadn't had a drink of water in days, Kamilla pulled her waterskin from her bag and poured it onto the soil the talking flower rested in, her attention back on the sky in search of the yowlwing. "Too much!" Kamilla practically jumped at Roo's exclamation, now noticing she'd drenched the soil in water to the point that it was no longer being absorbed. "Sorry Roo." Was all she could say, sounding at least slightly apologetic this time as she tilted the pot to allow the excess water to fall out.

"First you try and *hiccup* deflower me with a rock and then you try and drown me too."

A frown found it's way to Kamilla's face at the flower's dramatic recollection of events and it only deepened at the plant's hiccup, which seemed an unusual reaction for a plant, ignoring the fact that it could talk. And could plants even drown? Unfortunately, her question was partially answered as she noticed the, usually bright lavender, flower begin to sway from side to side whilst it's petals took on a more bluish colour, at which point Kamilla began to worry, having never seen this happen before. "Roo, are you okay?" Her voice was curious though undertones of concern were evident.

"Okay? *hiccup* I'm just... just... peachy! I'm a peach!"

At this point Kamilla was unsure whether she should be concerned or amused by her talking plant's sudden drunken behavior, though she decided she'd rather be safe and try and get as much of the water from the soil as possible, though she had no idea how. She continued to watch as Roo swayed constantly, its two leafy offshoots waving about aimlessly, hiccuping every so often. She considered entirely replacing the soil, but with no suitable soil on the beach they'd have to return to town for her to do so and with Yen nowhere in sight it certainly wasn't an option. Kamilla had never let the yowlwing out from the inn and she was certain Yen wouldn't be able to find her if she left now.

With no viable options Kamilla decided they would just wait until the yowlwing returned and hope that Roo didn't get anymore 'inebriated' until she had a way of drawing the water from its soil. An idea sparked within her then, to simply discard the waterlogged soil and use her geomancy to create new soil but she quickly deflated, not confident she'd be able to create anything more than stone dust. A loud grumble of disappointment escaped her lips at the lack of options before another idea slowly began to form. What if she tried to draw the water from the soil using reimancy?

The task was far easier said than done, as there was one glaringly obvious hindrance in sight from its inception... she'd never shown any signs of having control over the reimantic element of water. It wasn't impossible though, she already had control over two elements and it had been an equal amount of years since she'd gained the second. Hopefully all she'd need to do to grasp at the next element would be to try and recreate the process by which she'd gained control of air so long ago.

Closing her eyes, Kamilla tried her best to recall the night that she'd obtained her second element. As she remembered it, it had been Spring of 515AV and she had been aboard a ship bound for Sahova, filled with a mixture of excitement and anxiety of what the undead Isle would be like, despite her expectations being entirely wrong. She remembered standing on the deck that night, no sounds other than the creak of the ship's wood, the waves crashing against the vessel and the ocean winds, something had been dancing about her consciousness during her meditation that night and the more she'd tried to grasp at it, the more unattainable it seemed, it was only once she'd stopped trying to reach out to it that the element had come to her.

Kamilla sighed to herself, opening her eyes to observe her surroundings in search of any sign of her yowlwing's return but finding none at all before turning her attention back to Roo's form to inspect the flower's condition. The now bluish flower had stopped swaying from side to side and was now hanging its petals resembling a person slumped over, if not for the odd hiccup coming from the plant every so often she may have thought it dead. It seemed they'd be remaining on the beach for sometime longer, giving her time to focus on the task at hand.

Taking a deep breath, which she held onto for a few ticks before slowly exhaling, Kamilla began calming her mind and relaxing her body, thankful for the soothing sounds of the waves which helped her along into a state of meditation. She sat there in silence, unmoving and almost undistracted, if not for Roo's spontaneous hiccups, though she did her best to pay them no find and fall deeper into her own consciousness. She had to reach a state of calm where she could begin to visualize the current elements within the reach of her djed and from there try and divine that of water.

Trying to calm her thoughts as best she could, eyes closed and breathing slow and deliberate, Kamilla attempted to do away with her five mundane senses and focus entirely on the sixth, one which was exclusive to those familiar with the use and existence of djed. It took a few chimes before she felt as if she’d blocked out the majority of the sounds and smells of the ocean, though she found the odd hiccup from Roo far more difficult to ignore.

Deepening her breaths, Kamilla turned her focus inwards and towards the well of power within her, her djed, feeling it flow within her body and stir under her attention. Coaxing a small amount of the energy towards her lungs, the sorceress exhaled slowly, emitting a fist sized cloud of glistening lavender res, not needing to open her eyes to see it since she could sense it with ease, it was part of her after all.

As always when res was produced, focusing on the external energy itself as she reached out to it with her consciousness, Kamilla could sense the elements she already had control of, almost as if they were slowly orbiting the cloud of res awaiting their chance to transmute it. Her first and favorite was of course earth, which in her mind registered as a strong and solid presence, the second being air which was the complete opposite, whimsical, elusive and intangible but to the sorceress’ surprise and excitement, she realized she could now sense the beginnings of a third presence. Though not quite as tangible as the first two, the third presence skirted and flowed just outside what Kamilla considered her sphere of influence when it came to her res, she’d experienced the same thing the night she’d finally obtained the element of air. Unfortunately, the sorceress had also learnt that it was no use trying to forcefully grasp at a new element as it would simply avoid capture, the best strategy was to relax and allow the presence to come to her instead.

Many more chimes passed with the sorceress deeply rooted in her meditation in attempt to coax the beginnings of this newest element into entering her sphere of influence before she felt as if it was finally beginning to respond, still flowing about just outside her reach but coming gradually closer until Kamilla could practically feel the soothing coolness and fluidity of the water element brushing up against her consciousness.

”She’s back!... *hiccup*”

Kamilla almost hissed at the drunken plant’s interruption, she’d been so close, she could feel it, but now that her concentration had been broken she knew it would take a very long time to regain the state of calm focus she had just been in. ”Roo, do you ever...” she cut herself off as her brown eyes opened to the sight of Yen, her gray yowlwing fluttering slowly down towards her before finally landing on the sand. The cloud of res Kamilla had produced had long since decayed, leaving behind no traces of its existence.

Looking around, Kamilla realized that the sun had already begun to set, realizing that they must have been there a lot longer than she’d originally thought. With a loud sigh and cat like stretch, Kamilla went to retrieve Yen, giving the winged feline a few gentle scratches behind the ears before placing it in her bag where the yowlwing would instantly pass out, no doubt exhausted from a long day of flying about. Grabbing Roo, who’s petals still had a bit of a bluish tinge to them, though thankfully less than before, Kamilla turned on her heel and began the long walk back to the Kulk, thinking about how close she had been to obtaining a new element the entire time.